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The United Nations Summit for Refugees and Migrants will be held on 19 September 2016 at the UNHQ in New York. The high-level meeting to address large movements of refugees and migrants is expected to endorse an Outcome Document that commits states to negotiating a ‘Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework’ and separately a ‘Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration,’ for adoption in 2018.
The surge in asylum seekers and refugees arriving in Europe over the last two years is regularly described as a crisis. Certainly the numbers are significant: in 2015 there were about 1.2 million asylum applications in Europe, double the number in 2014 which was already a record year. The human suffering should also not be underestimated; almost 4,000 people are believed to have drowned in the Mediterranean trying to reach Europe in 2015.
Europe is currently scrambling to cope with the arrival of over one million asylum seekers. Responses have ranged from building walls to opening doors. European Union countries have varied widely in their offers to resettle refugees.